Cross-border critical transportation infrastructure: a multi-level index for resilience assessment

Today, more than ever before, our society depends on interdependent infrastructure systems, such as transportation, energy, water, and telecommunications networks. These systems are often considered critical because they are necessary for the organization, functionality, and stability of a modern industrialized country. However, these infrastructures are vulnerable to accidents, malicious failures, and disruptions that could generate consequences impacting on the economy, health, safety, and welfare of the citizens of a country or of several neighboring countries. The disruption of critical cross-border transportation infrastructure, road or rail, as a result of a major event can affect the area where the event occurs and a wider area. Depending on the type and duration of an event, which can be natural or anthropogenic in origin, it is possible to estimate the impacts on the mobility of people and goods in terms of delays (alternative routes), increased traffic (congestion), and a potential increase in accidents. For instance, in 2019 there was an accident in Rastatt (Germany) that affected rail traffic on the Karlsruhe-Basel line of the Rhine-Alpine corridor in Europe. The rail line was disrupted for more than 50 days, causing disservices and about 2 billion Euro in economic losses in Germany, Switzerland, and Italy. The extended disruption of road and rail sections can have consequences (impacts) not only on the transport system but also on the socio-economic system in a macro-regional context. The research is part of the SICt project - Resilience of Critical Cross-Border Infrastructure developed in the Interreg VA Italy-Switzerland Programme 2014-2020. The work aims to define a RI - Resilience Index for the road and rail transport network falling within the study area. The RI index describes the capability of each network element (i-th link) to cope with a relevant event. The formulation of the index involves the calculation of three independent indicators: i) RIRM - Rescue Management related to the resources that can be activated and used to cope with an event; ii) RIPP - Plans & Management related to the speed with which the necessary resources can be activated and in fact, considers management aspects such as the presence of plans and procedures; iii) RIRN - Network & Traffic related to the robustness of the elements of the transport network. This work aims to present the proposed model and its application to the project area that includes the Lombardy Region (Italy) and the Canton Ticino (Switzerland) within the SICt Project

Analysis of the safety efficiency of a road network: a real case study

In this paper, recently introduced topological measures of interconnection and efficiency of network systems are applied to the safety analysis of the road transport system of the Province of Piacenza in Italy. The vulnerability of the network is evaluated with respect to the loss of a road link, e.g. due to a car accident, road work or other jamming occurrences. Eventually, the improvement in the global and local safety indicators following the implementation of a road development plan is evaluated

Feasibility of high-voltage systems for a very long drift in liquid argon TPCs

Designs of high-voltage (HV) systems for creating a drift electric field in liquid argon TPCs are reviewed. In ongoing experiments systems capable of approx. 100 kV are realised for a drift field of 0.5-1 kV/cm over a length of up to 1.5 m. Two of them having different approaches are presented: (1) the ICARUS-T600 detector having a system consisting of an external power supply, HV feedthroughs and resistive voltage degraders and (2) the ArDM-1t detector having a cryogenic Greinacher HV multiplier inside the liquid argon volume. For a giant scale liquid argon TPC, a system providing 2 MV may be required to attain a drift length of approx. 20 m. Feasibility of such a system is evaluated by extrapolating the existing designs.Comment: 8 pages, 13 figures, to appear in Proc. of 1st International Workshop towards the Giant Liquid Argon Charge Imaging Experiment (GLA2010), Tsukuba (Japan), March 201

Cross-border Digital Platform for Transport Critical Infrastructure Resilience: Functionalities and Use-case

The resilience of increasingly interdependent Critical Infrastructure (CI) systems hugely depends on the stakeholder organizations’ ability to exchange information and coordinate, while CI’s cross-border dimension further increases the complexity and challenges. This paper presents the progress in the Lombardy Region (Italy) and Canton Ticino (Switzerland) on the joint capacity to manage disruptive events involving transportation CI between the two countries. We present a cross-border digital platform (Critical Infrastructure Platform – PIC) and its main functionalities for improved cross-border risk and resilience management of CI. A use case, based on a scenario of an intense snowfall along the transboundary motorway impacting both countries, demonstrates how PIC advances the exchange of information, its visualization and analysis in real-time. The use case also shows the practical value of the digital platform and its potential to support the management of cross-border events (and their cascading events) that require the cooperation of Italian and Swiss actors

poly generation capability of a biogas plant with upgrading system

Abstract Biomass, together with other renewable sources, is increasingly used to provide energy to minigrids and distributed generation systems. Particularly, biogas production seems an interesting solution as it can be used to produce electricity, heat and bio-methane (through an upgrading system). In addition, biogas can be relatively easily stored in gasometers to compensate for small request variations. On the other hand, the amounts of heat, electricity and bio-methane produced are strictly dependent one on the others. A poly-generation scenario was considered starting from an existing case study made up of a digester, a 600kWel micro gas turbine and an upgrading system for bio-methane production. An off-design system simulation was carried out to analyze the energy and mass fluxes between plant components as a function of the fraction of the biogas sent to the upgrader. The constraints and relations between heat, electricity and bio-methane production were extensively analyzed. Results show that this system can be a versatile poly-generation unit

Is the solar neutrino deficit energy-dependent?

All existing measurements of the solar neutrino flux are compared with the predictions of the most recent solar model by Bahcall and Pinsonneault, modified by introducing the hypothesis of neutrino oscillations with mass differences large enough to render energy-independent any quantity observable on earth. It is concluded that the data are consistent with this hypothesis and that, at least for the time being, any energy-dependence of the solar neutrino deficit must be regarded as just an attractive theoretical possibility, but not as a compelling reality.Comment: 6 pages, 1 figure, contributed paper to the XVIII Int. Symposium on Lepton-Photon Interactions, Hamburgh, Germany, 28 July - 1 August 199

Bracket base remnants after orthodontic debonding

Objective: To evaluate whether the debonding procedure leads to restitutio ad integrum of the enamel surface by investigating the presence of enamel within the bracket base remnants after debonding. Materials and Methods: Sixty patients who completed orthodontic treatment with fixed appliances were included. A total of 1068 brackets were microphotographed; the brackets presenting some remnants on the base (n \u200a=\u200a 818) were selected and analyzed with ImageJ software to measure the remnant area. From this population a statistically significant sample (n \u200a=\u200a 100) was observed under a scanning electron microscope to check for the presence of enamel within the remnants. Energy dispersive x-ray spectrometry was also performed to obtain quantitative data. Results: Statistically significant differences in the remnant percentage between arches were observed for incisor and canine brackets (P < .0001 and P \u200a=\u200a .022, respectively). From a morphologic analysis of the scanning electron micrographs the bracket bases were categorized in 3 groups: group A, bases presenting a thin enamel coat (83%); group B, bases showing sizable enamel fragments (7%); group C, bases with no morphologic evidence of enamel presence (10%). Calcium presence was noted on all evaluated brackets under energy dispersive x-ray spectrometry. No significant difference was observed in the Ca/Si ratio between group A (16.21%) and group B (18.77%), whereas the Ca/Si ratio in group C (5.40%) was significantly lower than that of the other groups (P < .323 and P \u200a=\u200a .0001, respectively). Conclusion: The objective of an atraumatic debonding is not achieved yet; in some cases the damage could be clinically relevant